3/26/2014

SAN FRANCISCO — State Senator Leland Yee has been indicted for public corruption as part of a major FBI operation Tuesday morning spanning the Bay Area, according to law-enforcement sources.

Yee, D-San Francisco, highlights a string of multiple arrests that also includes infamous Chinatown gangster Raymond “Shrimp Boy” Chow, connected to a variety of charges including racketeering and drug crimes, sources said.

FBI agents and local police are serving arrest and search warrants throughout the Bay Area, with agents seen in locations in San Francisco and San Mateo, as well as Yee’s Capitol office in Sacramento. One of the searches was at the San Francisco Chinatown office of the Gee King Tong Free Masons and is linked to Chow’s arrest.

I think they mean “Wednesday morning” because my impression is that this is all going on right now.

Thanks to MM.

P.S. Perhaps my favorite tidbit:

Yee is the state’s third Democratic legislator recently tied to corruption allegations. In February, State Sen. Ron Calderon, D-Montebello, surrendered to authorities after being indicted on bribery charges. In January, Assemblyman Roderick Wright, D-Inglewood, was convicted of voter fraud and perjury stemming from a 2010 indictment.

Voter fraud? Why, voter fraud never happens!

Never fails. Republicans always have the sex scandals, while Democrats tend to have the corruption scandals.

State Sen. Leland Yee of San Francisco has been detained after a series of raids by FBI and gang task force officials Wednesday, according to various media reports.

FBI agents searched Yee’s state Senate office Wednesday morning but declined to comment to The Times on the nature of their investigation. News photos showed Yee, a Democrat who is also running to be California’s secretary of state, in the backseat of a patrol car as he arrived at a federal courthouse in downtown San Francisco.

Dan Lieberman, Yee’s press secretary, told The Times his office would not comment on the FBI raids, which were reportedly linked to the arrest Wednesday morning of Raymond “Shrimp Boy” Chow.

Somehow the L.A. Times declined to provide one of those photos. If a reader finds one, let me know and I will post it.

Charlotte Mayor, Patrick DeAngelo Cannon, was arrested today by FBI agents for alleged violations of federal public corruption laws, announced Anne M. Tompkins, U.S. Attorney for the Western District of North Carolina. The federal criminal complaint filed in U.S. District Court, charges Cannon, 47, of Charlotte, with theft and bribery concerning programs receiving federal funds, honest services wire fraud and extortion under color of official right.

For his efforts to bring greater government transparency, Senator Leland Yee (D-San Francisco/San Mateo) will be honored with the Public Official Award by the Northern California Chapter of the Society of Professional Journalists (SPJ) on Thursday, March 20, at 6:00 PM, at the City Club in San Francisco.

“I am honored to receive this award from the Society of Professional Journalists,” said Yee. “I’m proud to share the stage with so many who have done so much to keep our government open and accountable.”

Yee received the award in recognition of his opposition to efforts to weaken the California Public Records Act by loosening disclosure requirements for local governments.

Yee has authored numerous bills designed to make government more transparent.

State Sen. Leland Yee of San Francisco has been detained after a series of raids by FBI and gang task force officials Wednesday, according to various media reports.

FBI agents searched Yee’s state Senate office Wednesday morning but declined to comment to The Times on the nature of their investigation. News photos showed Yee, a Democrat who is also running to be California’s secretary of state, in the backseat of a patrol car as he arrived at a federal courthouse in downtown San Francisco.

Dan Lieberman, Yee’s press secretary, told The Times his office would not comment on the FBI raids, which were reportedly linked to the arrest Wednesday morning of Raymond “Shrimp Boy” Chow.

Somehow the L.A. Times declined to provide one of those photos. If a reader finds one, let me know and I will post it.

Oh, I’m sure there is, but the limit of the public’s tolerance does not extend so far as to replace Democrats with Republicans.

That is true in SF because there simply aren’t enough Republicans to get anyone elected there. But I do believe that 2014 is going to see an increase in Republican office holders in California state government and in county and municipal elections, too.

In fact, I believe the story of Democrat losses at the state and local level nationwide is going to be a bigger story than elections having to do with DC. The Democrats are going to be swept out of power in several areas at lower levels of government.

you’re right. Your document itself says that there isn’t evidence to substantiate the claim that Sanchez was elected due to vote fraud.

> In conclusion, had the Task Force and Committee not acted to consider the merits of this contest,significant vote fraud and vote irregularities would have goneundetected. However, the number of ballots for which the Task Force and Committee has clear and convincing evidence that they were cast improperly by individuals not eligible to vote in the November 1996 election is substantially less than the 979 vote margin in this election.

That is to say
(a) there is evidence of vote fraud and voting irregularities
(b) the number of cases of vote fraud for which there is clear and convincing evidence is SMALLER than the margin of victory.

* voters living in districts with Republican congressmen are not inclined to re-elect them, by a 43 (not inclined)-36 (inclined)-21 (depends) margin.
* voters living in districts with Democratic congressmen are somewhat inclined to re-elect them, with a 47 (inclined)-36 (not inclined)-17 (Depends) margin.

Until the 2014 election names a senator for what is the 8th district (the one from the recent redistricting) there is no senator representing them. The confluence of the new boundaries and the staggered terms of state senators left portions of the new district unrepresented until the 2014 election. “One man, one vote” only means something when the government says it does.

Yee is the senator for the current 8th district, which will get different boundaries and a new number. I believe he is termed out, anyway, but has announced as a candidate for Secretary of State. He will probably win, indictment or not.

17. I would be shocked to see a significant increase in Republican power in California as a result of this election. Nationwide, yes. In California, no.

Watch. Looks like Republicans will likely pick up at least one US House seat at least, and maybe two. But the largest influence on November’s election hasn’t happened yet. California is going to be faced with a brutal drought this summer. We have had practically no rain this winter. The Central Valley is going to be a dust bowl. Over 200 million heads of lettuce and tons of table grapes are not going to make it to dinner tables this year. The price of fresh produce is going to skyrocket.

Meanwhile, Brown shovels dollars to projects that do not provide one single drop of additional water and provide projects for maybe someday cities can drink their own sewage. While all that is going on, we have billions earmarked for a train set that nobody wants.

Everyplace outside of the urban Los Angeles and San Francisco Bay metro areas is going to be fired up by the time November comes around. The problem is, those two places have 2/3 of the voters in California.

If you don’t live in California and you have room for a garden, I would recommend you plant one this year even if you don’t usually do so.

Crosspatch, I lived in California prior to 2011, and I’m familiar with the politics.

I think that – aside from SecState, where I think Dan Schnurr has a chance – the most likely outcome is that all of the statewide officeholders remain Democrats after the November election.

Conservatives have been predicting a Republican-Conservative resurgence in the state for 20 years, and it hasn’t been happening. The drought, and the economic effects thereof, provide them with an opening … but the state Republican party has shown itself to be incapable of taking such openings and making successes out of them.

Charlotte Mayor, Patrick DeAngelo Cannon, was arrested today by FBI agents for alleged violations of federal public corruption laws, announced Anne M. Tompkins, U.S. Attorney for the Western District of North Carolina. The federal criminal complaint filed in U.S. District Court, charges Cannon, 47, of Charlotte, with theft and bribery concerning programs receiving federal funds, honest services wire fraud and extortion under color of official right.

Hey, don’t forget us here in Illinois! Rep. Farnham ran unopposed for reelection in the March 18 primary after the FBI raided his home and office looking for kiddie pron and resign afterward.

Reports that federal agents were looking for evidence of child pornography when they seized computers from the Elgin district office of former state Rep. Keith Farnham shocked local officials who said the lawmaker was well-liked and active in the community.

For this to happen, on a more than individual basis, two things have to be true:

1) It is not easy to do absentee ballot fraud – that is, in that jurisdiction most voting must be in person.

2) The people committing the fraud do not control the election machinery – because if they did, they’d just stuff the ballot box, have voters sign in who never voted.

Furthermore, to get away with this without scandal, a third thing has to be true:

3) There must be no significant political opposition in the elections in question.

There are two kinds of cases of organized in-person voter impersonation fraud in the United States. In one case there was an organization in part of Brooklyn that did in person impersonation in the 1980s. Absentee ballots are hard to get in New York – and they didn’t control the election machinery, and there was very little opposition.

I think they actually used made up names whom they registered, although they could have used people who’d died or moved away. After many years these people were indicted and convicted.

The other kinds of cases were minor party primaries, where again there was very little organized political opposition. They voted in primaries in the names of people who maybe didn’t even realize they were registered in that party and would never show up to vote. Very few people cared about that election.

This was also in New York. In most other states, they would do absentee ballot fraud, which also happens here.

Voter ID, by the way cannot prevent in-person impersonation fraud.

In Israel it happened in 1999 in a Knesset election and it happened last year in the Beth Shemesh municipal election.

In Israel there is almost no absentee balloting – something designed to prevent Israelis living abroad from voting, with exceptions for diplomats, and people must use their national ID cards.

The way it works is like this: A political party or organization collects identity documents from people whom they are not sure will go to the polls, assembles a group of people, and matches them to the pictures.

In both cases religious parties were involved, in the second case it was sort of like a coalition.

In such cases there might be enough trust, or dependency, for people to surrender their documents. Not every party can do this.

Also required maybe is that only one dcument would work. If not, the person who turned over his document for the day might listen to someone who was encouraging people to vote and, like an idiot, show up at the polls.

In the first case, the vote was for the Knesset where there is proportional representation, so no other party was really hurt by some other party maybe getting an extra seat out of 120, so there was in effect, no significant political opposition with an incentive to go after the fraud. Half the other parties were happy enough anyway to see the extra seat go to them.

It was just a story in a newspaper and the investigation, if any, sort of died, I think. They had some 50 men with beards to cast votes for others. They each had to make sure they memorized the number before they went in to vote because they are asked for it before voting and most people know that by heart.

In the more recent case, it went to court, and the election was re-run, with the party that cheated winning the second time. (they also used new registrations from people who had lived outside before, and this was based on people who consented to lend their identity documents, so there were real people, who just attempted to give other people their proxy but were willing to vote for them anyway. This involved both men and women. People were overheard talking. It was actually the women who pushed this and got the election poverturned. And there was a raid during election day where a collection of ID documents was found. The legal case is still active.)

In 2000, Yee was arrested in Hawaii on suspicion of boosting an $8.09 bottle of suntan oil by putting it in the front of his shorts.

A year earlier, Yee was pulled over twice by San Francisco police officers who suspected him of cruising the Mission District in search of prostitutes.

aphrael: Obama took several counties of California by less than 5 points. The affinity for Democrats is not all that strong in many places. The real problem is numbers. Republicans as a percentage of voters statewide are only 28.7% of registered voters compared to 43.6% who are Democrats. It isn’t even close and you can’t blame the state GOP for that.

In fact, most California voters have no idea how the GOP is organized and believe it is organized like the DNC is. For example, if you live in California, your local county Republican Committee is not affiliated with or funded by the RNC. It is completely separate. Local Democrat Committees ARE affiliated with the central DNC. That is how the DNC could pressure Democrats to support Filner by threatening to kill their political career for life as a Democrat if they didn’t support him.

In the Republican party the local county and state committees live on donations directly to them. Most people who are registered Republican do not know that and believe the RNC has some role in state / local politics, it doesn’t.

When you have a considerably smaller portion of the population as Republicans and the majority of those people in relatively rural areas, you can’t bring in a lot of money. The state committee was talking about closing their office in Sacramento for lack of funds only 2 years ago. The California GOP just doesn’t have much money. The Democrats in California get huge sums from the newly minted millionaires at Google, Facebook, Twitter, etc. The Republicans get their money from farmers that are being driven out of business in the Central Valley.

We have to face facts. People just do not seek political office in order to represent and be servants of the public much these days. There’ve always been bad eggs and corruption and bought votes but I really do not think to the degree we’ve seen almost nationwide recently.

A GOP candidate for Long Beach (CA) City Council related that Jim Brulte (head of the CA GOP) told candidates that at the local level, there are more elected Republicans than Dems, but this isn’t trumpeted because these offices are all “non partisan”.

As to Yee, I’m sure this was all ginned up by Rush Limbaugh in response to Yee’s criticism of a Rush comedy gig on his show using “pidgin Chinese”.
No corruption in Sacramento, not even a smidgeon.

The story seems to be she was a pollworker, and she voted absentee and then also voted at the polls!

This was the only charge they had against her, it seems, but they threw the book at her and sentenced her to 5 years in prison, and there was a whole campaign for a reduction of her sentence, which succeeded.

There must be something more to it than that.

She claimed she wasn’t sure the absentee vote would count.

It might be that had some protections in place against this kind of double voting (i.e. the name should be removed from the list of voters at te polling site) but maybe she committed some kind of fraud in order to do that.

I also would think the first rule before counting absentee ballots is to check whether or not the voter voted at the polls, if that’s possible.

A GOP candidate for Long Beach (CA) City Council related that Jim Brulte (head of the CA GOP) told candidates that at the local level, there are more elected Republicans than Dems, but this isn’t trumpeted because these offices are all “non partisan”.

There are still more counties in California with a Republican majority than with a Democrat majority but many of these counties have sparse populations. But these counties all have governments so they have all the same sorts of positions so yeah. Heck, there are even a couple of Republicans on the San Jose city council.

SF, I remember a study from a decade ago that showed that 10’s of thousands of residents (home owners) in PA were also registered to vote at their second homes in FL.
Now, why would you do that if you didn’t plan to vote at both addresses?
Yeah, right, it was just so they could engage in property tax issues (please roll that bridge up, we’ve go a sucker for it).
Just to register in two different jurisdictions is, according to the letter of most voter law, is a violation, a fraud.

“And he resigned the next day saying he’d been “ill for a long time”.”

elissa – He resigned after the primary, not after the raids, which preceded the primary. Those illnesses suddenly became an obstacle to Keith campaigning and serving after the raids/unopposed primary. I question the timing!

She might have voted in the names of four other people, one of whom was her granddaughter, by filling out absentee ballots in their names. Her granddaughter says she gave her permission..but proxy voting is not legal. It violates ballot secrecy for one thing.

And the other three were absentee ballots that came from her address, signed with handwriting that looks like hers. Richardsom claimed that some of them (?) reside at her house.

An issue here also is that she used her position as a poll worker to cvover her tracks.

Apparently there is some suspicion there could even have been more cases.

Watch. Looks like Republicans will likely pick up at least one US House seat at least

They will also pick up a couple of state senate seats. The current state senate is better than 2/3rd Democrat (28-12), despite the GOP picking up a seat in a by-election. They are keeping Wright, Calderon and no doubt Yee in their seats to maintain their super-majority.

the state Republican party has shown itself to be incapable of taking such openings and making successes out of them.

Perhaps, but the state party seems to be far less concerned with social issues than it once was. It is not only the drought but the water diversions from the central valley and the damn bullet train that could flip some seats.

That’s absolutely correct daley, but Farnham’s name was already on the ballot and there were no other candidates. There were only a very few days between the time of the actual raid and his actual resignation. Primary day was one of those days and there had been early voting. People were scratching their heads over the ICE raids cuz he’s such a “great guy”. The feds were mum but once the papers ferreted out what the feds were looking for a coupla days later, it was over and he resigned the day after the primary. As an added feature he had sponsored legislation to crack down on kiddie pron. Kind of hoping for the Pete Townshend defense in case he got caught, I imagine. These pedophiles are truly evil.

For his efforts to bring greater government transparency, Senator Leland Yee (D-San Francisco/San Mateo) will be honored with the Public Official Award by the Northern California Chapter of the Society of Professional Journalists (SPJ) on Thursday, March 20, at 6:00 PM, at the City Club in San Francisco.

“I am honored to receive this award from the Society of Professional Journalists,” said Yee. “I’m proud to share the stage with so many who have done so much to keep our government open and accountable.”

Yee received the award in recognition of his opposition to efforts to weaken the California Public Records Act by loosening disclosure requirements for local governments.

Yee has authored numerous bills designed to make government more transparent.

Evelyn E. Burwell’s family was surprised to learn she voted in the 2012 general and primary elections. They knew she was an avid voter, but she’s been dead since 1997 … The former Wantagh resident, who died at age 74, is also among roughly 270 people that records show voted in Nassau County after dying, a group that includes a man who voted 14 times since his death.

“An issue here also is that she used her position as a poll worker to cvover her tracks.”

Sammy – It’s funny how that works. A group here in Chicago recently announced that they found at least 70,000 ineligible voters, people who had died or moved or ineligible for other reasons, still registered in just four wards.

You say you had not read about stories like Melowese Richardson and I’m not surprised at all. I don’t think the news sources you use have any interest in covering stories like that which go against “teh narrative.” They similarly in avoiding coverage of legal gun owners defending themselves against crime so gun control nuts believe all gun owners are crazed red neck killbots.

When an automatic voter registration renewal card or information about a polling place change can’t be delivered to a deceased person it goes to the dead letter file and ultimately back to the sender (the county clerk or some such). Crooked ones then know exactly whose names they can “vote” under and can effect a fictitious “address change”. I hate to say it but I fear this happens a lot when you are dealing with “public servants” to whom their oath of office means nothing, and for whom the “end justifies the means”.

elissa – I’m not disagreeing with anything you are saying about Farnham. I’m just pointing out that his “health issues” apparently did not prevent him from seeking reelection. I don’t believe his original resignation announcement mentioned them either. I think the “health issues” were suddenly revealed to give clarification to the reasons for his resignation.

Personally, given his health issues, I think Illinois Democrats should use him as a posterboy for Obamacare!

I’m curious and am too lazy to look it up, Kevin M. Does Fluke have actual ties to California, or is she there simply to run for office in a favorable environment? For some reason I assumed she was an east coaster.

I’m aware that Obama took several counties by less than 5 points and that there isn’t a strong Democratic affinity in a lot of places.

On the other hand, I’m also aware that there’s a strong anti-Republican affinity in a lot of places.

The best demonstration of this, to my mind, comes in the electoral career of former LA County DA Steve Cooley. DA is a nonpartisan race, so his partisan affiliation didn’t appear on the ballot any of the times he ran for DA; in those elections, he carried LA county by large margins. He won in 2000 64-36; He won in 2004 and 2008 by winning outright majorities in the primary.

When he ran for AG against Kamala Harris (disclaimer: I voted for *Cooley* in that election), and his partisan affiliation appeared on the ballot, he lost Los Angeles county, 53-39.

What this says to me is that, in LA County at least, the Republican label is toxic.

> The real problem is numbers. Republicans as a percentage of voters statewide are only 28.7% of registered voters compared to 43.6% who are Democrats. It isn’t even close and you can’t blame the state GOP for that.

Why can’t I blame the state party for that? Isn’t increasing Republican registration the state party organization’s job?

I understand the concept that prior results are not necessarily predictive of future results, and I can see where the drought is a huge issue in the central valley. That said, from what I can tell from afar, the suburban LA and bay area voters have been generally content with the Brown administration, and so I find a large-scale revolt unlikely … and Republican fixation on the drought, and the train, to be yet more wishful thinking of the sort the party has been good at for the last two decades.

This is Anita Moncrief’s very ooccasional blog. (last post: March 8, 2013; previous post: October 6, 2010 – she actually got a new site then: emergingCorruption.com – but it was hacked in 2012, and she may not have been able to restore the site.

Sammy – Anita Moncrief is very old information at this point. The reason for bringing her up is to illustrate the bias of The New York Times in avoiding coverage of stories which run counter to the liberal narrative.

77. SF and the surrounding counties are far more Democratic than SoCal. Even LA isn’t 70-80% Dem like SF, San Mateo and such. The state as a whole is about +10 Dem. Republicans won the governorship in 82, 86, 90 and 94, with people far more conservative than Arnold.

IMHO, the decline has been mostly by an aversion to the social issues that the national party has been beating on. Lose that, and let the Dems try to run on pocketbook issues and their track record alone, and things will change.

It would also help to recover the Asian vote and make inroads among middle-class Hispanics.

> Republicans won the governorship in 82, 86, 90 and 94, with people far more conservative than Arnold.

True, although the state as a whole is less conservative today than it was then. In those days, for example, San Mateo and Santa Clara counties were swing counties; they aren’t any more. (Neither is LA county, for that matter).

Others from my state may well disagree, Kevin M. and I respect that. But as far as I’m concerned you have somewhat described the political landscape in IL as well. Many areas of Cook and the collar counties have a lot of votes and a lot of economic concerns and some money. The influx of professional level Asians, for example, here over the last decade is breathtaking.

George Deukmejian or Pete Wilson could never win the Governor’s mansion in CA today.
The demographics of the CA electorate have changed too much since when they ran for office.
Also, the public employees are too numerous, and too powerful in CA.

This is much more than just getting the conservative message out to voters.

In LA county, the Registrar reports that voter ID is 50% Democrat to 22% Republican.
And about 19% declined to state.

> In the roughly two years since the districts were drawn, their party complexion has changed in a fairly uniform way that matches statewide trends: roughly static Democratic registration, declining Republican registration, and climbing independent/other registration. The largest deviations from these broader trends have occurred in one area of Riverside County, where Assembly Districts 60 and 61, Senate District 31, and Congressional District 41 have seen a drop in the share of independent/other registration and an unusually large increase in Republican registration. There are also a few districts in California where Democrats have fared especially well compared to Republicans (AD 13 around Stockton and CD 47 in Long Beach and northern Orange County) and a few where the opposite has been true (AD 21 and SD 12 around Merced and CD 10 around Modesto).

This is interesting because it suggests that the independents are largely dissatisfied Republicans, and because it suggests a Republican surge in the Inland Empire, which could be significant in local legislative races in November.

Did Evelyn E. Burwell vote in person, or by absentee ballot? A lot of older people, who may have once requested an absentee ballot on account of sickness, or limited mobiliy, will cotinue to get that year after year. Did she still get mail? Or was she, in 1997, a resident of a nursing home or assisted living center?

Or as this at home? Was someperson who knew her impersonating her? Was this every year?

Newsday says the numbers of such dead voters are too few and far between to constitute a coordinated fraud attempt. They say some of these votes coud be clerical errors (people signing on the wrong line? People with the same or similar names? How?)

There were about 6,100 deceased voters still registered in Nassau County – more than in any other New York county, and 4 New York City boroughs and Erie County (Buffalo) I think have higher populations – of which 270 votes after dying, or about 4.5%. Suffolk County had 2,490 of which roughly 50 voted at least once after dying, or 2%.

There are 842,000 registered in New York who haven’t voted in ten years (people used to be removed after 2 years without voting, then 4, then never. I think now they went back tp purging, but mail has to be returned and then people not vote in 2 federal elections)

There are 5,820 voters still registered, as of last October, who died before the 2000 election.

Apparently so, though I think I also remember seeing an interview with him where he was desperately trying to figure out a way to restore some sort of affirmative action program without it impacting on Asians — a suggestion for expanding total annual UC enrollments with the new slots reserved exclusively for black & Latino kids, so that there would not be a net reduction in Asians. As if that weren’t trying to have it both ways.

I do not doubt that social conservatism works in many states, but it stopped working in California some time ago, and now repels people. There are any number of people, particularly younger women, who now vote straight Democratic because of the abortion thing. No woman of child-bearing age has even known abortion to be illegal or birth control to be unavailable. This genie is not going back in its bottle any time soon — it will take a cultural revulsion BY YOUNG WOMEN before it does.

I agree with aphrael that we are unlikely to see a Republican surge in November. I use my own CA Senate district as a barometer: it’s the one where Sandra Fluke is running (alas). The field right now is something like five Democrats, but it appears that the only Republican who had expressed interest didn’t collect enough signatures to qualify for the ballot.

Granted, this Senate district is tilted about 60-40 in favor of Democrats and granted, holding elective office in California is a lot more attractive prospect to Democrat activists than it is to GOP activists, but considering the crowded Democrat field and the open primary where the top two go on to a runoff, this would have been an excellent opportunity to get a Republican into the final run-off against what potentially may end up being a hard-core left-wing activist. But when your party is so disorganized that it can’t even recruit and qualify its candidate, there isn’t much to suggest you are going to make headway in the next election.

One of the reasons that the GOP may surge in the 2014 CA state senate is the way the reapportionment played out. A lot of districts changed numbers, and the even-odd election scheme made some areas unrepresented for two years, or represented by people they never would have elected. Many of these even numbered districts are in the northern forest or the San Joaquin valley. I see a likely two seat gain here.

IIRC, you can file with completely bogus signatures and you have to either fix the deficiency or pay a fee.

I hope that’s correct. The Republican (some politician from Beverly Hills, I think) is appealing the decision, so hopefully he can get it straightened out. Hell, I’ll sign his petition if someone would tell me where I go to do it.

If the Democrats are going to be in an ObamaCare hangover and won’t flood to the polls, and if conservatives are motivated to get out the vote, and if Independents decide they will vote for Jerry Brown but will consider GOP Assembly and Senate candidates, then I think there is a chance for a Republican in CA Senate District 26. Lots of “ifs” but still in the realm of possibility.

History has shown over the years that when government attempts to tax things at prohibitive levels (cigarettes) or ban things outright, it provides a market that organized crime fills. It would not surprise me that someone active in controlling legitimate access to something would be involved in the illegal trafficking of that thing.

SAN FRANCISCO – For his efforts to bring greater government transparency, Senator Leland Yee (D-San Francisco/San Mateo) will be honored with the Public Official Award by the Northern California Chapter of the Society of Professional Journalists (SPJ) on Thursday, March 20, at 6:00 PM, at the City Club in San Francisco.

“I am honored to receive this award from the Society of Professional Journalists,” said Yee. “I’m proud to share the stage with so many who have done so much to keep our government open and accountable.”

…Kerry, by the way, while recently in Indonesia, blasted climate change deniers, warning, “Climate change may be the world’s ‘most fearsome’ weapon of mass destruction and urgent action is needed to combat it,” wrote CBC News Canada.

This scare tactic –– now adding to the long list of liberal crap, which includes ludicrous allegations that climate change will lead to “an orgy of killing, looting, rape and burglary” (just ask James Delingpole) –– surfaced just weeks after President Obama’s State of the Union address (January 28, 2014) where he emphatically declared that the climate change debate is over.

“Climate change” is a scam. It’s the pretext for what’s just a heist. Like Barack Obama’s stimulus.

…Moreover, a year ago, we blew the lid off of Climate Hawk Kerry and his part in green corruption. What’s most disingenuous is that while Kerry preaches “global warming doom and gloom,” his “government carbon footprint” is enormous –– with no end in sight. (And who’s tracking his personal carbon footprint?) Worse, Kerry played a part in crafting President Obama’s 2009 stimulus bill, which was a piece of legislation that allowed him to create a financial footprint inside this scandal as well. This includes timely green energy investments with the Big VC firm Kleiner Perkins (where “climate billionaires” John Doerr and Al Gore are partners) that will be mentioned many times in this post, including the fact that this firm was a huge winner from the Green Bank of Obama.

This stuff should be just as illegal as Yee’s activities. Which can be fairly characterized as a scam, too. Second Amendment advocates have pointed out for years that criminals can always get guns. Places that ban guns are awash in them; just about every foreign country I’ve ever been to has banned or tightly restricted legal firearm ownership. It isn’t like people like Yee are too stupid to get that. They just see that as a business opportunity to exploit. Of course, he was just stupid enough to get involved in criminal activities with Shrimp Boy, a guy who’s been caught and convicted so many times I’m amazed at his headwork.

the story goes farther back, back in the 80s, he was investigating BCCI, among other elements, while he was receiving campaign funds, from the BCCI South Florida’s front man, David Paul, for the Senate campaign committee,

“This really ought to utterly put paid to the vile hypocrisy and jack-booted thuggery that is the current gun control extremist movement.”

SPQR – I don’t know, I think a lot of the gun control extremists are just racist liberals who don’t want scary black people to own guns but mask that guilt by implementing stupid rules that impinge on the constitutional rights of all gun owners. Just look at correlation between where crime is the worst and gun control is the strictest.

Recall how when these green energy companies would go bust the Obama administration would pay off the investors first rather than “the taxpayers” even though the law said otherwise about first in line. It was Obama was paying people like Kerry off.

It was happening right out in the open. A massive theft. It was frustrating to watch it as it happened and no one seemed to notice.

When Illinois Democrat Keith Farnham resigned from the State Legislature last Wednesday citing “health reasons” no one suspected his “health” problem was kiddie porn.

At this writing, Farnham has not been charged with kiddie porn possession or arrested for having child pornography. The only indication of his guilt is that the FBI raided the house of a member of the state legislature looking for evidence of child pornography based on sufficient probable cause to merit a search warrant.

There is some delicious irony here, too. If the accusations of possession of child pornography are proven, Farnham masqueraded as a tireless advocate for children:…

Typical. We have a gun-grabber gun runner getting arrested in Kali. And we have a child-advocate kiddie porn Illinois.

Lest you think I’m rushing to judgement, when Farnham resigned it was the day after he had won his primary unopposed. So I suspect there’s something to this.

ABINGTON, Pa. – March 26, 2014 (WPVI) — Pennsylvania state prosecutors won a first step Wednesday in their corruption case against state Sen. Leanna Washington, securing a judge’s ruling that they have enough evidence for a trial on charges that Washington crossed the line when she allegedly ordered taxpayer-paid employees to organize an annual “birthday party” political fundraiser.

For eight years, Washington pressured her Senate staff to devote weeks to drawing up guest lists that included city and state officials, creating invitations and taking money from invitees that ultimately went to Washington’s campaign account, prosecutors say.

They also allegedly used taxpayer-paid computers, copiers and office supplies.

Washington, 68, declined comment after the two-hour hearing at Kessler’s Montgomery County office. Washington, a Democrat who represents parts of Philadelphia and Montgomery County, is running for a third full term this year.

Oh good lord. Here’s an R running for Governor in California. He’s a registered sex offender and served a decade in prison for voluntary manslaughter. He may be a changed man and may have found God but governor? Really?

I don’t know, elissa, I think it’s rather fitting that the new governor of kali would have go down to a Sacramento PD station and register while giving them the address to the governor’s mansion. It’s sort of a metaphor for the entire state.

Of course I’m joking. The only way you can get elected to anything as a registered sex offender and after spending 10 years in prison is to register as a Democrat and run for city council in Washington DC.

Prosecutors almost never go to war against each other. But in Pennsylvania, Democratic attorney general Kathleen Kane is being brutally criticized by Seth Williams, Philadelphia’s district attorney and a fellow Democrat. Williams is upset that last year one of Kane’s first acts in office was to decline to prosecute four Philadelphia state legislators and other government officials. In a sting operation, all had been caught accepting cash or Tiffany jewelry in exchange for votes or favors. Kane, who is white, has defended herself, saying that the investigation was badly managed and tainted by racism. She claims the criticism comes from what she calls the “Good Ol’ Boys Club.” Williams, who is African American, has shot back: “I have seen racism. I know what it looks like. This isn’t it.”

I like how Miss Liberal White Guilt thinks she can tell Seth Williams what racism is. Apparently the state AG refused to prosecute because the sting only netted black officials. So unless investigators don’t have an affirmative action program to catch corrupt white officials she thinks she should toss the case.

The problem with that is that the police informant who agreed to wear a wire to cut a deal on his fraud charge made offers to Republicans and Democrats. But only the Democrats took the bait.

I live here, I’ve never heard of the guy. There are only two GOP candidates that have any real visibility: Tim Donnelly who is the “Tea Party” candidate, great guy, but not taken very seriously outside of the Central Valley and Neel Kashkari who is most likely to win the nomination. I had never even heard of the guy you mentioned until your posting and most likely few others in the state have either.

–Elissa – it’s decently easy for utter kooks to get on the primary ballot in California. He’ll get creamed in the primary and then quietly go away.
Comment by aphrael (5cffd4) — 3/27/2014 @ 9:44 am–

Aphrael and Crosspatch–I know it’s not a huge deal, and as one of 4 running on the R primary ballot obviously you’re right about the outcome for Mr Jailbird. But this kind of thing just reinforces the “crazee Republican” theme to those who do read about him. Am I wrong to assume that the Dog Trainer and other larger California papers and TV stations always do a series of “Know the Candidate” profiles leading up to the primary? election?. Good times.

52. 59. 60. 60.==I don’t think the story of Melowese Richardson even made the New York Times.==

Comment by elissa (1aca9b) — 3/26/2014 @ 12:20 pm

Do you ever write to the editors of the NYT, Sammy? If it’s true that they never printed the story or only lightly mentioned it, you would do the citizens of your country proud by asking them why.

Not often, but now they promise to be more interactive:

Dear Times Subscriber,

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We’ll also be introducing Times Premier — for those with a curiosity that matches our own. With this new subscription option you can deepen your connection to The Times by gaining access to a wide array of exclusive content and additional benefits.

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We’ll be sending you more information about your new subscriber benefits and Times Premier soon.

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